Getting ready for a busy tax season typically means firms need to staff up with some extra hires. But no matter how good the people you find are, they can’t be successful without an effective onboarding process. An ideal onboarding program should start on your employees’ first day—or even earlier if possible—with all new hire paperwork completed online before their first day in the office.
At its core, an onboarding program sets clear expectations about employees’ responsibilities and defines what success looks like at your firm. But it doesn’t stop there. It also covers training and providing constructive feedback to make sure both employee and management are playing their parts.
If you’re one of the 22% of companies that doesn’t have a formal onboarding process, get started on one today! Here are three ways your firm can use technology to help ensure your onboarding process is working as planned.
1. EXCHANGE NEW EMPLOYEE PAPERWORK
Get the onboarding process started smoothly and securely by using CCH® Client Axcess to share key documents prior to new employees’ start dates, including paperwork that needs to be signed and returned to the firm. Your firm can store key documents in a secure section of CCH Axcess™ Document for collaboration as well.
2. TRACK ONBOARDING MILESTONES
Once you have an onboarding plan in place, you need to track the various milestones such as training, feedback conversations, and other professional development. If you use a project management solution like CCH Axcess™ Workstream, you can add these tasks and deadlines so new employees have a clear plan in place.
3. SET AND MONITOR PERFORMANCE EXPECTATIONS
You can keep an eye on employees’ performance and progress with CCH Axcess™ Data Insights. The newest module provides data visualizations on six different pre-built dashboards, including a staff dashboard that shows employee KPIs— like if projects fall within budgeted hours. Set up the performance measures most important to your firm so you can use that data to make informed decisions on how to improve performance on an ongoing basis.
Onboarding by the Numbers
If you’re still not convinced that taking time to develop a comprehensive onboarding process is
- Organizations with a standard onboarding process experience 50% greater new hire retention.
- New employees who went through a structured onboarding program were 58% more likely to be with the organization after three years.
- 69% of employees are more likely to stay with a company for three years if they experienced great onboarding.
Get Ready for the Rush
Learn how you can staff up and onboard efficiently in time for tax season by downloading our ebook Building Firm Culture.
